ken cuccinellihttp://www.readthehook.com/taxonomy/term/2049/all
enCan Anyone Stop Ken Cuccinelli? Here's how Virginia's pro-life, pro-gun attorney general could take over the Governor's Mansion.http://www.readthehook.com/109386/can-anyone-stop-ken-cuccinelli-heres-how-virginias-radical-pro-life-pro-gun-attorney-general-
<p>by Peter Galuszka<br /><br />It is a wintry afternoon on Saturday, Jan. 11, 2014. Strutting against a cobalt blue sky, a fife and drum corps dressed in resplendent red and blue colonial garb plays martial airs in front of the steps of Virginia's stately Capitol. The governor is about to take his oath of office administered by the chief justice of the Supreme Court of Virginia:</p>
<p><em>I, Kenneth Thomas Cuccinelli II, do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia and I will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties incumbent upon me as Governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia to the best of my ability. So help me God.</em></p>
<p>It's a surreal, if not bizarre, moment. Cuccinelli, a hard right-wing maverick, has managed to get to this position in a once-solidly conservative state where gradual changes are making it more centrist, if not progressive.<br /><br />Didn't Virginians vote twice for Barack Obama, the nation's first black president, and choose Democrats for two of their last four governors? Didn't voters blunt the tea party movement that reared its rattlesnake head three years before? Aren't huge demographic shifts led by an influx of more diverse newcomers resetting Virginia's politics from red to purple to blue?<br /><br />During these inauguration festivities, social conservatives and libertarians may be cheering, but others find it absolutely apocalyptic. Gay rights activists, artists, and social workers are stunned at the ascension of the former attorney general, who won fame for bashing homosexuals in state government and for staging a long and expensive campaign against former UVA professor Michael Mann, who maintains, like most climatologists around the world, that humans are responsible for global warming.<br /><br />For women's rights activists, the scene is especially bitter. On these very steps nearly two years before, 30 of them and their supporters were manhandled and arrested by flak-jacketed state troopers and Capitol Police officers for protesting a bill that mandated women to submit to transvaginal ultrasound exams prior to undergoing legal abortions.<br /><br />Cuccinelli, a staunch pro-lifer, didn't publicly support the transvaginal bill, but became a central figure in the dust-up over a new state law requiring abortion clinics be regulated as "hospitals." Pro-choice advocates say the law is a disguised attempt to shut down the clinics with cumbersome regulations. In another move seen as anti-gay, Cuccinelli has petitioned to keep Virginia's law making sodomy a crime. On March 12, the U.S. Court of Appeals&nbsp; struck down Virginia's law criminalizing oral and anal sex as unconstitutional, based on a a 2003 Supreme Court ruling in a Texas case. Years ago, such laws were used to target homosexuals. Cuccinelli has said he's appealing the court decision because the Virginia case involved underage sex.<br /><br />Also scratching their heads are the state's Main Street Republicans, led by outgoing Gov. Robert F. McDonnell, whose carefully crafted succession plans were laid to waste by Cuccinelli's brash independence and clever moves. Watching intensely on the sidelines are national news media, which see Cuccinelli's campaign as a litmus test of how conservatives can come back after their drubbing in the 2012 elections.</p>
<p>How did Cuccinelli get here?<br /><br />The simple, but wrong answer is that Cuccinelli merely tacked left of the center after Virginia painted itself blue and went for Obama in 2012. To be sure, the 45-year-old took some turns, such as siding with environmentalists against powerful state utilities for getting renewable energy ratepayer charges for dams they built nearly 100 years ago.<br /><br />But this view diminishes Cuccinelli's talent as a political tactician.</p>
<p>"Cuccinelli is not going to move to the center on anything," says political analyst Bob Holsworth. "He's just outside the corporatist structure."<br /><br />Indeed, Cuccinelli, who declined to be interviewed through a spokesman for this story, seems impervious to traditional Old Dominion politics. He has his own social code, of sorts, and his own strident outsider's view, which, reviewing his history, is hardly a surprise. With Cuccinelli, what you see is what you get. Just about every move he makes can be traced back to a similar one he made years before.<br /><br />Bucking tradition, he has refused to step down as the state's top legal officer. The stance has proven problematic. Cuccinelli finally agreed to recuse the attorney general's office in a tax case involving Star Scientific, a Henrico County-based maker of dietary supplements. He did so after <em>The Washington Post</em> reported on March 31 that Cuccinelli holds stock in the firm and initially failed to disclose his holdings. Cuccinelli has said he has corrected the error. The <em>Post</em> also reported that Cuccinelli and two aides have used the expensive Goochland house owned by Jonnie R. Williams, the chief executive of Star Scientific, which has also given gifts to members of the family of Gov. Robert F. McDonnell.<br /><br />Still, Cuccinelli is not to be sold short in politics. "Democrats are underestimating his potential vote-getting appeal," says Paul Goldman, longtime Democratic strategist and former state Democratic chairman. "Look at Ronald Reagan&#8211; no one thought he would win because he was too conservative."<br /><br />Cuccinelli has already shown his mastery of tactics. One of the reasons he was able to finesse his candidacy within the Republican Party was a palace coup he helped stage in June. The central committee of the Republican Party, taken over by a band of arch-conservatives, voted 47-31 to nominate the party's gubernatorial candidate in 2013 in a closed convention rather than the open primary that was agreed upon in 2011.<br /><br />&nbsp;It was a big win for Cuccinelli, and it set him up for the gubernatorial candidacy, because selection by closed convention is open to less meddling by outsiders. Primaries tend to be big-money deals with lots of political advertising, some of which is paid for by taxpayers. Primaries are also open to all voters, regardless of party. Shifting from a primary to a convention in 2013 was a major loss for the Republican establishment, including McDonnell and U.S. Rep. Eric Cantor, the House Majority Leader, who's played an enormous role in the fiscal cliff debates.<br /><br />Going with a convention was the death knell for two-term Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling, first elected to the post in 2005, when Democrat Tim Kaine won the Governor's Mansion. Bolling, a mainstream Republican, agreed to step aside and not challenge McDonnell when McDonnell ran for governor in 2009, with the somewhat presumptuous understanding that his turn would come in 2013.<br />&nbsp; <br />For a while, all looked well for the McDonnell camp. He had an approval rating of better than 60 percent, televised well, and was able to recast himself from his social conservative views on gays and women from the 1990s to something more acceptably moderate. The grand plan was for McDonnell to be selected as Mitt Romney's vice presidential candidate in 2012. Bolling, a get-along, go-along guy from Hanover County, would smoothly step right in and serve the remainder of McDonnell's term, and assume the power of incumbency in the 2013 election.<br /><br />It didn't turn out that way. Romney didn't pick McDonnell, in part because of ugly national fallout over the trans-vaginal abortion exam requirement that brought the state derision during the 2012 General Assembly. Romney's campaign proved a disaster and Obama easily beat him, shoving national and state Republican parties, including the Old Dominion's, into a swamp of soul searching.<br /><br />With Cuccinelli seemingly firmly entrenched as the GOP's gubernatorial nominee, Bolling quit the race. He melodramatically dissed Cuccinelli on Newsradio 1140 WRVA, stating: "I question his electability in a statewide campaign for governor." Bolling eventually declined to run as an independent, citing cash and family concerns.<br />.<br />For their part, the state's Democrats are only now becoming organized, and the best they've come up with is Terry McAuliffe, a Washington insider, environmental investor, schmoozer and former head of the Democratic National Committee. Well-regarded U.S. Sen. Mark Warner chose not to run again for governor, a job he held from 2002 to 2006, clearing the path for the charismatic Cuccinelli. Polls put the race at 50-50.<br /><br />Most of the recent events are presaged in Cuccinelli's playbook, which fits his unyielding anti-government philosophy, except where it interferes with his views on sex, gays, and marriage. As a state senator from 2002 to 2010, for example, he backed strict conservatives and opposed allowing voters to participate in political primaries regardless of their party affiliation. Doing so would allow more moderates to participate and dilute conservative power.<br /><br />He's been true to form on any number of other issues, such as his hands-off policy on guns, arming school personnel after the Sandy Hook massacre, forbidding children of undocumented immigrants born in the United States to automatically become citizens, keeping state funding for sex education focused on "abstinence only," and being the first attorney general in all 50 states to legally challenge Obamacare.<br /><br />&nbsp;He's pushed for state Medicaid fraud investigators to carry firearms in their jobs that aren't exactly fraught with danger. Declaring "homosexuality is wrong," he's fought gay marriage and refused to support resolutions stating that gays shouldn't be discriminated against in state jobs, including those at public universities.<br /><br />The same suspicion of government carries through on other issues, but with a twist. Cuccinelli fought vigorously to free convict Thomas Haynesworth after DNA testing found that Haynesworth was innocent of the rapes for which he'd served 27 years in prison. Cuccinelli later helped Haynesworth find a job. Other revealing and countervailing acts include declaring that high-school students shouldn't be required to pay $75 to take Advanced Placement tests, and a crackdown on payday lenders.<br /><br />Cuccinelli is sensitive to the plight of the mentally ill. While he appeals to the anti-government conservative base, he's also pressed to restrict the mentally ill from legally obtaining guns, and has called for more communication between doctors and the courts in mental health cases. After Sandy Hook, he called for more mental-health funding.<br /><br />He also handed $100,000 from his surplus inauguration donations to the Daily Planet, a downtown Richmond medical clinic that offers free health care to the homeless.</p>
<p>"Inauguration events," Cuccinelli said when he made the donation, "are certainly a celebration of the peaceful transfer of power in a democracy, but they can also stand as a time to bring to light the needs of some of society's most vulnerable, underserved citizens."<br /><br />So what drives Cuccinelli's worldview? His background offers clues. Born in New Jersey, he moved to Northern Virginia when he was 2 after his father, a chemical engineer, changed jobs. According to a lengthy 2010 profile in <em>The Washington Post Magazine</em>, Cuccinelli dominated his two younger brothers in a bossy, perfectionist way.</p>
<p>Devout Roman Catholics of Italian and Irish descent, his middle-income parents found the money to send Cuccinelli to Gonzaga College High School, an expensive private school on North Capitol Street in Washington. Gonzaga is run by the Jesuits, a Catholic order known for strict academic discipline and strong belief in social justice.<br /><br />It rubbed off. As a mechanical engineering major at the University of Virginia, Cuccinelli shunned his preppie Wahoo demeanor to help run a group supporting female students against sexual assault by male students crazed by booze and machismo.<br /><br />After law school at George Mason University, practicing business law, and a stint as a state senator, he and his wife, Tiero, moved to a 10-acre property in Prince William County, from which he has commuted to his job in Richmond as the state's top lawyer. Their seven children are and have been home-schooled into the seventh grade. Tiero told the <em>Post</em>: "His priorities are God, me, the children and everything else."<br /><br />Cuccinelli was once an intern for L. Douglas Wilder, the country's first black elected governor who shares remarkably similar ideas on government spending. Like Rep. Eric Cantor, a rival conservative with whom he doesn't get along, Cuccinelli shares a fondness for rap music. He also likes paintball and holds an annual private camouflage-and-splatter competition among friends in Loudoun County to raise political funds.<br /><br />Mix together Cuccinelli's extreme social views with his in-your-face provocations against the state's traditional political and business establishment and you have a political race that the national media is dying to cover.<br /><br />In a piece headlined "Virginia embodies GOP's woes," Politico recently noted the irony that Cuccinelli is such a powerhouse in an off-year election just after the GOP got an electoral drubbing, which many people blame on the party's social agenda: "What gnaws at Virginia campaign veterans is the degree to which Cuccinelli is already defined as a polarizing culture warrior at a moment when Republicans seem to be clamoring for kinder and gentler candidates."<br /><br />"Cuccinelli will be a test of the internal Republican argument of how they can win," analyst Holsworth says. "They can say we need to moderate our message or our message is already moderated the right way."<br /><br />While Holsworth insists that Cuccinelli won't budge on his core views, there's some evidence of him shifting away from issues such as immigration, which is now a political nonstarter, to issues that may have broader appeal.<br /><br />In late November, for example, Cuccinelli issued a scathing report on a voluntary state environmental program called the "Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS)," which allows utilities Dominion Virginia Power and Appalachian Power Co. to charge customers extra for supposedly using renewable energy sources such as hydroelectric, solar, or wind.<br /><br />But the utilities aren't developing much in the way of new and alternative energy sources, Cuccinelli's report says. Instead, they're using out-of-state dams, some 80 years old, to get the credits amounting to $15 million during the past two years for Appalachian Power and possibly $76 million for Dominion for that period.<br /><br />The report got attention, especially because it came from an attorney general notorious for his attacks on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the climate-change lobby. Green groups have given their quick, if skeptical, approval.<br /><br />Dawone Robinson, Virginia policy coordinator for the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, praises the report but notes that the law setting up the standards remains unchanged. "The timing of Ken Cuccinelli's report is very interesting," Robinson says. "He did a five-year-review and he didn't have to. He did it, coincidentally, just as he's running for governor."<br /><br />Pundits already expect money to flow during the 2013 gubernatorial race in Virginia, which has no limits on spending. The race "figures to be one of the most expensive in state history," wrote <em>The Washington Times</em>. Indeed, records from the Virginia Public Access Project show that campaign contributions to "Cuccinelli for Governor" are already coming in. As of December 31, Cuccinelli had $1,178,624, with McAuliffe totaling $1,039740. The figures are certain to change with mid-April reporting. McAuliffe, for instance, has picked up about $2 million more thanks to out-of-state fund-raisers helped by Democratic big wigs such as Bill Clinton, James Carville and Dee Dee Myers, <em>Politico</em> reports.<br /><br />In Virginia, some of the biggest contributors are Richmond specialty chemical mavens Floyd D. and Bruce C. Gottwald, who contribute regularly to conservative causes, Smithfield Foods and Richmond law firms McGuire Woods and Williams Mullen. In Charlottesville, contributors include John R. Quinn ($1,100), Management Services Corp. ($1,000) and Old Dominion Highway Contractor Association ($1,000) <br /><br />One out-of-state name stands out: Koch Industries Inc. The Wichita, Kansas-based company is the second-largest privately held entity in the country, run by Charles and David Koch, staunchly conservative billionaires who have bankrolled the libertarian think tank Cato Institute. David Koch donated $50,000 and coal giant Consol Energy of Pittsburgh gave $25,000. Other out-of-state funds for Cuccinelli are coming from Texas, Wyoming, and North Carolina.<br /><br />Despite such powerful backing, Cuccinelli's campaign appears to have had its teething pains. <em>Politico</em> reports that the attorney general seemed to ramble at a recent Alexandria fundraiser. He also kept using the word "illegals" when asked about immigration policy, a complex issue involving documented as well as undocumented foreign nationals.<br /><br />He has fierce opposition in some corners, including the women's rights activists who emerged after last year's General Assembly session. The grass-roots, pro-choice activists&#8211; including those behind "Cooch Watch," a blog that chronicles the attorney general's comings and goings&#8211; have become adept at reframing Cuccinelli's pro-life advocacy as an attack on women.<br /><br />Still, Cuccinelli seems in a strong position given his colorful nature. McAuliffe is working to overcome his outsider image that helped him lose his 2009 gubernatorial bid in the Democratic primary to state Sen. Creigh Deeds (D-Bath County). <br /><br />While Republican strategist Chris LaCivita, says that Cuccinelli will be "continuing some of the things that McDonnell has done," he did not specify exactly what, and Cuccinelli has opposed McDonnell on some major issues. He has come out strongly against McDonnell's major victory on his signature transportation plan that will define his legacy. The plan is the first major reform of highway funding since 1986 and would replace the gasoline tax with hikes on the sales tax and through other methods. It will eventually raise $6 billion for roads and other forms of transit. Cuccinelli has said that Virginians don't need more taxes and has questioned the plan's constitutionality.<br /><br />For now, Cuccinelli has an obvious advantage as the ultimate contrarian candidate. His association with the now-diminished tea party movement shouldn't be a factor. As Holsworth says, "He was tea party before the tea party was tea party." If Cuccinelli plays his iconoclastic advantage as skillfully as he has outmaneuvered McDonnell and the rest of the Republican establishment so far, his inauguration could very well become a reality.</p>
<p><i>&nbsp;</i></p>
<div><i><span style="color: #000000;">Peter Galuszka is a contributing editor to </span></i><span style="color: #000000;">Style Weekly</span><i><span style="color: #000000;"> in Richmond, where a version this article and the photos by Scott Elmquist first appeared.</span></i></div>
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http://www.readthehook.com/109386/can-anyone-stop-ken-cuccinelli-heres-how-virginias-radical-pro-life-pro-gun-attorney-general-#comments_BreakingNewsFeaturedelectiongovernorken cuccinelliCover StoriesMon, 08 Apr 2013 16:30:58 +0000Hook Contributor109386 at http://www.readthehook.comFoggy bottom: River rights case could impact Virginia economy http://www.readthehook.com/106985/foggy-bottom-river-rights-case-could-impact-virginia-economy
<p>Two years ago, Charlottesville business owner Dargan Coggeshall was angling for some trout on the Jackson River. Today, he's <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/103902/river-law-update-local-angler-gets-day-court" target="_self">angling for a court ruling </a>he hopes will preserve public access to Virginia's waterways. <br /><br />While the <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/troubled-waters-landowners-angler-wrangle-over-access-to-va-river/2012/08/19/bded84d0-e25c-11e1-98e7-89d659f9c106_story.html" target="_self"><em>Washington Post</em> recently waded into the controversy</a>, a lawsuit that reprises the classic property rights versus public access debate, Coggeshall is hoping that the State's Attorney General will get his feet wet on this one.<br /><br />"This is a huge story, waiting to be broken open," says Coggeshall. "But someone needs to hold the elected officials accountable." <br /><br />Indeed, what started out as a personal affront to Coggeshall&#8211; he and his brother-in-law were arrested for trespassing while wading in the Jackson River, just below Lake Moomaw, in Alleghany County following a complaint from a shore-side property owner&#8211; gradually became a cause, one that could now have important ramification for Virginia's economy.<br /><br />According to a 2006 study by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, recreational fishing in Virginia brought in $816 million and created 14,700 jobs. There were an estimated 640,000 resident anglers in the state, not counting tourists, and that was six years ago. Today, it's estimated that the state's recreational fishing industry generates more than a billion dollars annually.<br /><br />Should more and more private property owners get to determine who uses their section of the river bottom, it could create new and complicated obstacles for anglers and guides.</p>
<div class="sidebar">
<h2>Earlier story</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.readthehook.com/102634/river-law-local-angler-fights-fishing-rights" target="_self">"Riverlaw: Local anger fights for river access"</a></p>
<p><a href="http://www.readthehook.com/103902/river-law-update-local-angler-gets-day-court" target="_self">River law update: Charlottesville angler gets a day in court</a></p>
</div>
<p>Under Virginia law, all its waterways are owned by the state and considered public property. However, some river-side property owners have been able to get around the law by producing so-called "crown grants" that were issued by the King of England over 250 years ago. And Virginia courts, along with the state's Attorney General's office, have considered them legitimate documents of ownership.</p>
<p>In 1996, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled in <em><a href="https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&amp;q=cache:iBx05r3I-eMJ:vwrrc.vt.edu/pdfs/specialreports/sr131999.pdf+&amp;hl=en&amp;gl=us&amp;pid=bl&amp;srcid=ADGEEShoF0sFctwpJcgk23SI-Xw9p-wRg_RtsyRshwT1Jxc_VqrC5xMJIWgpW2gv5-DVLy3MHMjE7RTG3jjHpsGV6X3Y0HCtDMAgiqkW5x73g-3vR_zCJUw1aA2DsUZJPMezoPOJt0aU&amp;sig=AHIEtbQzGtwmlQF-ociN74N5GicEc_sYpg" target="_self">Kraft v Burr</a></em> that land grants by Kings George II in 1750 and George III in 1769 gave four landowners the right to prohibit fishing along a 3-mile stretch of the Jackson just below the Gathright Dam. <br /><br />River rights advocates and anglers, of course, were alarmed. After all, the government-built Gathright Dam, completed in the 1960s, had created one of the most ideal trout habitats in the state, due to the release of the deep, cool waters of Lake Moomaw. What's more, the state regularly stocked the river with trout. However, during the <em>Kraft v. Burr</em> case that practice ceased, though the stretch of river is now known for its abundant wild trout. Indeed, the <a href="http://www.fishntheedge.com/" target="_self">River's Edge development, </a>where the property owners challenging Coggeshall live, markets itself as an angler's paradise.</p>
<p>River rights advocates, however, say states like Virginia need to stop honoring these old crown grants and start enforcing their own laws.<br /><br />"Since the 1970s, courts have ruled consistently in favor of recreational use on rivers," Eric Leaper, executive director of the National Organization for Rivers (NORS), a Colorado-based non-profit, told the <em>Hook</em>. "So, you own the riverbed? So what. The public has a right to the river, no matter who owns the river bed. Rivers are recreational thoroughfares."</p>
<p>Ryan Brown, the legislative and policy manager for the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, says they've been watching Coggeshall's case closely and calls it a "really important one."</p>
<p>"It's a private case," says Brown, "but the practical effects could be detrimental to the public use of the river."</p>
<p>While an Alleghany District Court judge dismissed the trespassing case against Coggeshall, the property owners in the River's Edge Community and their developer, claiming they own the river bottom on which Coggeshall was wading, moved forward with a civil lawsuit against Coggeshall and his brother-in-law seeking $10,000 in damages.</p>
<p><a class="colorbox" href="/files/images/field_images/news-rivermap-f.jpg"><span class="fid22822 imagecache-200px_wide"><img src="http://www.readthehook.com/files/imagecache/200px_wide/images/field_images/news-rivermap-f.jpg" border="0" title="The section of the river in question lies just below Smith Bridge, which runs by the River's Edge residential development." /><span class="caption">The section of the river in question lies just below Smith Bridge, which runs by the River's Edge residential development.</span></span></a> &nbsp;Coggeshall has fought back, forming the Virginia Rivers Defense Fund, and arguing that Virginia's waterways, much like sidewalks in a city, should be seen as public rights of ways. And he's called on Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli's office to defend the public's right to use them freely. <br /><br />"Why is the state abandoning me and my brother-in-law?" says Coggeshall. "Why is the state not protecting its property?"</p>
<p>"By law, we can't enter into legal disputes between private parties unless the dispute involves an interest of the Commonwealth," says Caroline Gibson, deputy director of communications for the Attorney General, "which we have determined is not the case here."</p>
<p>Coggeshall had tried to get the Commonweath to be a party to the lawsuit, but as Gibson points out, "a judge already agreed that the Commonwealth is not a necessary party to resolve this case.</p>
<p>"The court is the proper forum in which to resolve the competing interests at issue in this case," Gibson adds.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the property owners are claiming a right to the river bottom based on land grants that date back to one issued by the King of England in 1743.</p>
<p>As the <em>Hook </em>confirmed, river-side property owners are taxed on river bottom land that extends half-way out under the river, which is another reason why they say they have a right to determine who walks on it. And there's a slight distinction in this case: Unlike <em>Kraft v. Burr</em>, the property owners aren't challenging anyone's right to fish. But getting out of a boat and standing on the bank or the river bottom constitutes their idea of trespassing.<br /><br />The lawyer for the property owners, Roanoke attorney James Jennings, has declined to comment publicly on the case ahead of the trial, but he told the <em>Hook</em> last year that "This is not a fishing case. This is a trespassing case. These men were walking on the river bottom, and my clients own the river bottom."</p>
<p>On June 14, Alleghany Circuit Court judge Malfourd Trumbo granted the property owners a motion for partial summary judgment, allowing they had <em>prima facie</em> title to the property, which means, literally, that "at first glance" the property owners appear to own the river bottom. Now the burden of proof is on Coggeshall to show that Virginia law, which identifies the state's waterways as public lands, precludes ownership of the river bottom based on a 250-year-old king's grant. That's something he expected to have to do anyway.</p>
<p>"This cause," says Coggeshall, in one of his frequent blog posts, "is about our belief that law-abiding citizens&nbsp;should not be personally sued for using what has been promoted by the Commonwealth as a&nbsp;resource to be enjoyed by all."</p>
<p>Coggeshall hopes the trial, which has not yet been scheduled, brings some clarity on the issue, on where exactly the public can use the river and where they can't.</p>
<p>"Only clarity will end what is sure to be an accelerating&nbsp;cycle of intimidation, confrontation, myth, and ignorance," says Coggeshall, "none of which is good for our Commonwealth."<br /><br /></p>
http://www.readthehook.com/106985/foggy-bottom-river-rights-case-could-impact-virginia-economy#comments_BreakingNewsFeaturedDargan CoggeshallJackson Riverken cuccinelliNewsWed, 22 Aug 2012 01:53:06 +0000Dave McNair106985 at http://www.readthehook.comCuccinelli kibbosh: Supreme Court denies Mann demandhttp://www.readthehook.com/102952/cuccinelli-kibbosh-supreme-court-denies-mann-demand
<p>The Virginia Supreme Court rejects Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli's demand for UVA to <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/67811/oh-mann-cuccinelli-targets-uva-papers-climategate-salvo">turn over records</a> relating to climate scientist Michael Mann's work. T<em>he Roanoke Times</em> has<a href="http://www.roanoke.com/news/breaking/wb/305667"> the story</a>.</p>
http://www.readthehook.com/102952/cuccinelli-kibbosh-supreme-court-denies-mann-demand#comments_BreakingNewsken cuccinellimichael mannUVAOnline onlyFri, 02 Mar 2012 16:37:57 +0000courteney102952 at http://www.readthehook.comHeat is on: AG says Biscuit Run deal under scrutinyhttp://www.readthehook.com/65660/heat-ag-says-biscuit-run-deal-under-scrutiny
<p>Recently disclosed details of the Biscuit Run state park deal have prompted more than public outrage&#8211;- they may have prompted an investigation into the transaction that some allege was a government bailout of wealthy investors at taxpayers' expense.</p>
<p class="whitespace">"I can tell you and therefore reassure the public that the Biscuit Run matter is being reviewed by appropriate parties," writes Brian Gottstein, spokesperson for Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, in an email. "I cannot say any more than that without potentially compromising an investigation."</p>
<p class="whitespace">As reported in the <em>Hook</em>'s <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2011/01/06/COVER-BISCUITRUN-MAIN-g.aspx">January 6 cover story,</a> "Bad Men? New numbers show spiraling costs of Biscuit Run," the owners sold the 1,200-acre property to the state for $9.8 million in December 2009. Several months later, the Virginia Department of Taxation issued $11.7 million in tax credits, more than doubling the price. The former owners&#8211;- who include developer Hunter Craig and music mogul Coran Capshaw&#8211;- have appealed to the state to issue millions more.</p>
<p class="whitespace">Meanwhile, the new governor&#8211;- a Republican who <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/index.php/2010/10/27/biscuit-run-did-taxpayers-get-burned">initially endorsed the deal</a>&#8211;- now appears to be distancing himself from something arranged by his predecessor, Tim Kaine, who heads the Democratic National Committee.</p>
<p class="whitespace">"The acquisition of this land occurred during the Kaine Administration, not this one," writes Bob McDonnell's spokesperson, Stacey Johnson. "This Administration was not involved in that process."</p>
<p class="whitespace">The process, according to documents anonymously mailed to the <em>Hook </em>around Christmas, includes a questionable appraisal that might trigger millions more for the speculators. And yet, if not for the documents, the taxpayers who'll end up footing the bill would not have known that an Orange County&nbsp;appraiser asserted that the land was worth nearly $88 million&#8211;- nearly double what the speculators paid during the height of the real estate bubble.</p>
<p class="whitespace">"This type of secrecy is the worst," says Jim Moore, a government transparency advocate who's worked in real estate development. "I guess their excuse would be that it's socially acceptable to keep large private gifts private&#8211;- that making them public might discourage the wealthy from providing these gifts. But as we can now see, how can we tell that they're gifts?"</p>
<p class="whitespace">Moore says he hopes that the state will open the Biscuit Run files, change the laws that shrouded it, and punish any wrongdoers. However, Delegate David Toscano says he doesn't believe an investigation is actually taking place.</p>
<p class="whitespace">"I do know that [Department of] Taxation would look at this thing first, but there may be other places where it would be reviewed as a matter of course," says Toscano, who says use of the word <em>investigation</em> "implies something I don't think is happening here."</p>
<p class="whitespace">Toscano notes that he doesn't consider an investigation appropriate.</p>
<p class="whitespace">"Any time you have a transaction of this size, you're going to have a lot of differences of opinion about value," says Toscano.&nbsp; "If they can't agree, then there is some kind of court remedy to determine what that value is."</p>
<p class="whitespace">According to legal analyst David Heilberg, the AG's office may have authority to investigate even though it handled the real estate closing. And he notes that if the state allows the massive $88 million appraisal or even its own $39 million appraisal, another potential stumbling block for the investors hoping to recoup losses might come if they attempt to use their charitable donation for a federal tax deduction, opening up an opportunity for the IRS to investigate the land's actual value.</p>
<p class="whitespace">One person who won't be getting any tax credits or deductions&nbsp;from the Biscuit Run deal is DMB fiddler Boyd Tinsley. Although he was presented as a Forest Lodge investor at a January 8, 2010, event announcing the sale, and granted interviews about the "gift," a source close to the deal says that, in fact, Tinsley&#8211;- who spoke about his close personal friendship with Governor Kaine and said he'd learned about the transaction only weeks before the event&#8211;- never had any money invested in Biscuit Run.</p>
http://www.readthehook.com/65660/heat-ag-says-biscuit-run-deal-under-scrutiny#comments_BreakingNewsBusinessFeaturedCommunityGovt/Politicsbiscuit runHunter Craigken cuccinelliNewsTue, 11 Jan 2011 19:13:48 +0000courteney65660 at http://www.readthehook.comEnd run? Cuccinelli opines on abortion clinicshttp://www.readthehook.com/66779/end-run-cuccinelli-opines-abortion-clinics
<!&#8211; This will not be inserted &#8211;><!&#8211; This will not be inserted &#8211;><div class="captionLeftLandscape"><a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/news-planned-parenthood1.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-37456" title="news-planned-parenthood1" src="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/news-planned-parenthood1-325x243.jpg" alt="news-planned-parenthood1" width="325" height="243" /></a><strong>Planned Parenthood opted to meet more stringent standards when it built this facility on Hydraulic Road. </strong><small>PHOTO BY LISA PROVENCE </small></div>
<p>It was a busy week for Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, losing his quest for <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/index.php/2010/08/30/peatross-decides-judge-pens-halt-to-cuccinelli-inquest/">climate change</a> documents, asking Craigslist to yank adult ads, and issuing an equally controversial legal opinion on abortion.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"It was obviously a political maneuver," says Tarina Keene, director of the state chapter of an abortion rights group. Keene estimates that 17 out of the state's 21 abortion providers could not meet the stricter standards that Cuccinelli's opinion says the state could mandate. Currently, facilities for first-trimester abortions are classified as physician offices&#8211;- along with oral surgeons, eye doctors, and urgent care centers.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Keene, who runs <a href="http://www.naralva.org/news/press/201008251.shtml">NARAL Pro Choice Virginia</a>, protests that other surgeries riskier than abortion, like cosmetic surgery, breast augmentation, and eye surgery, also fall under the "physician offices" category, which is regulated by the <a href="http://www.dhp.state.va.us/medicine/">Board of Medicine</a>. Outpatient hospitals are under the jurisdiction of the <a href="http://www.vdh.state.va.us/administration/boh/">Board of Health</a>.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"Abortion is very well regulated," she says. "This is sort of a slap in the face to the Board of Medicine."<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">When he was in the General Assembly, Cuccinelli tried&#8211;- unsuccessfully&#8211;- to pass legislation regulating abortion providers. But in his capacity as AG, when pro-life Delegate Bob Marshall asked for an official opinion on that matter, Cuccinelli determined that yes, the Commonwealth can regulate the facilities that provide first-trimester abortions, as well as the medical personnel who perform them.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"The Attorney General is trying to attempt to generate a regulatory fix to something the legislature has refused to do by law or by statute," says <a href="http://www.plannedparenthood.org/about-us/index.htm">Planned Parenthood</a>'s David Nova.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Cuccinelli spokesman Brian Gottstein, however, disagrees and says issuing official opinions is part of the attorney general's job when a state agency or legislator requests it. "Official opinions are not the attorney general's personal opinions, but rather legal opinions," says Gottstein. "Issuing this legal opinion is not an 'end run' around anyone, because the law already says the state can regulate clinics."<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Indeed, Planned Parenthood's Nova has long prepared for this moment. When Planned Parenthood constructed new clinics in Roanoke in 2000 and Charlottesville in 2004, they were <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/Stories/2004/08/12/newsRuReadyAbortionOptions.html">built to the outpatient hospital</a><a href="http://www.readthehook.com/Stories/2004/08/12/newsRuReadyAbortionOptions.html"> specifications</a> "out of concern that one day the legislature would require us to operate as hospitals," explains Nova.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">That's not the case for Charlottesville Medical Center for Women, a Commonwealth Drive abortion provider, which declined to comment when contacted by the <em>Hook</em>.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"The Attorney General's opinion states the Commonwealth of Virginia has the legal authority to regulate abortion providers," says Nova. "Planned Parenthood agrees with that. Virginia has the authority and obligation to assure every medical facility operates professionally and safely."<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Where he draws the line: If the Board of Health uses the Attorney General's opinion to restrict access to first trimester abortions. "The ruling in and of itself doesn't do anything," says Nova. "It doesn't say the state will do this. It says the state <em>can</em> do this."<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">John Whitehead at the Rutherford Institute weighs in with support of tightened restrictions on clinics, even if it means first-trimester abortions are more costly and send women to other states. "Though it may seem undesirable to have Virginians crossing state lines to undergo less costly abortions, this concern must be secondary to the health risks associated with the Commonwealth maintaining a laissez-faire attitude toward abortion clinic safety" he writes in a letter to state Senator David Marsden.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Virginia, cautions Whitehead, "must see that its clinics don't become the dreaded 'back alleys.'"<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Actual examples of botched or risky abortions in Virginia were not produced and were not a factor in Cuccinelli's opinion. "It does not look at&#8211;- nor is it intended to look at&#8211;- specific instances of harm caused by a lack of regulation," says Cuccinelli spokesman Gottstein.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">The next move is up to Governor Bob McDonnell, who appoints members of the Board of Health, the regulatory body overseeing outpatient hospitals. McDonnell also opposes abortion, but he's bucked Cuccinelli before when the attorney general opined that colleges didn't have the authority to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"The Governor and members of the administration are currently evaluating and reviewing this opinion,” says McDonnell press secretary Stacey Johnson.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Over at the Board of Health, local appointee Willis Logan says at the moment, the opinion doesn't change anything, but he acknowledges that questions about the ruling are going to the governor's office, and that McDonnell has the final say on who makes up the Board of Health. Notes Logan, "I serve at the pleasure of the governor."<br />
</p><p class="whitespace"><em>Updated 10:40am with John Whitehead's observations.</em></p>
http://www.readthehook.com/66779/end-run-cuccinelli-opines-abortion-clinics#comments_BreakingNewsFeaturedGovt/PoliticsHealthabortionken cuccinelliFri, 03 Sep 2010 08:14:50 +0000lisa66779 at http://www.readthehook.comPeatross decides: Judge pens halt to Cuccinelli inquesthttp://www.readthehook.com/66745/peatross-decides-judge-pens-halt-cuccinelli-inquest
<!&#8211; This will not be inserted &#8211;><!&#8211; This will not be inserted &#8211;><div class="captionLeftLandscape"><a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/news-climate-peatross.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-37367" title="news-climate-peatross" src="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/news-climate-peatross-325x448.jpg" alt="news-climate-peatross" width="325" height="448" /></a><strong>Peatross' ruling leaves Cucinelli right to refile.</strong><br />
<small>HOOK GRAPHIC WITH DAN KACHUR PHOTO</small></div>
<p>The controversial "climategate" inquest by Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli came to a halt Monday as an Albemarle County judge issued a <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/news-cidopinion.pdf">declaration</a> that set aside a demand for old emails from Michael Mann, the former UVA professor and creator of the so-called "hockey stick graph," which posits that global temperatures are undergoing an unprecedented spike.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">In a case that drew international attention, both sides spun the decision their way.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">On the hot-button issue of whether such an inquest would have harmed academic freedom&#8211;- something that was argued by four rights groups in an amicus brief&#8211;- retired judge Paul Peatross seemed reluctant to carve out such a privilege.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"The Attorney General has the right to investigate if he meets the other requirements of the statute," wrote Peatross, noting that he was preserving Cuccinelli's right to refile a narrower inquest.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"I am pleased that the judge has agreed with my office on several key legal points," Cuccinelli said in a <a href="http://www.oag.state.va.us/PRESS_RELEASES/Cuccinelli/83010_UVA_CID.html">prepared statement</a>, "and has given us a framework for issuing a new civil investigative demand to get the information necessary to continue our investigation into whether or not fraud has been committed against the Commonwealth."<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Judge Peatross <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/index.php/2010/08/24/standing-by-mann-small-but-punchy-protest-blasts-cuccinellis-climategate-inquest/">heard arguments from the two sides</a> on Friday, August 20&#8211;- the same day that a small protest of UVA professors and students took place on the steps of the Rotunda.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">The Peatross ruling blistered the AG's office on several points including the state's failure to state precisely why it believes that old emails relate to a monetary fraud. Additionally, Peatross found that only one of the five grants Mann received at UVA actually consisted of state money, and so it didn't meet the requirements of the Fraud Against Taxpayers Act, or FATA, the 2003 Virginia law that gave the AG the right to his so-called Civil Investigative Demand.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Peatross also found that most of the grants preceded FATA, which was designed for frauds against the Commonwealth, but he left the door open to a refiling if the Attorney General can show that Virginia funds were paid during a time when FATA was in effect.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace"><em>&#8211;story updated for print with UVA's spin at 2:50pm, Tuesday, August 31</em></p>
http://www.readthehook.com/66745/peatross-decides-judge-pens-halt-cuccinelli-inquest#comments_BreakingNewsFeaturedglobal warmingken cuccinellipaul peatrossMon, 30 Aug 2010 16:30:10 +0000hawes66745 at http://www.readthehook.comCuccinelli's target Mann cleared by Penn State facultyhttp://www.readthehook.com/67184/cuccinellis-target-mann-cleared-penn-state-faculty
<p>The climate scientist at the center of Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli's UVA <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/index.php/2010/04/29/oh-mann-cuccinelli-targets-uva-papers-in-climategate-salvo/">document-seeking inquest</a> has been cleared of research misconduct by a faculty panel at Penn State, the University that currently employs him, according to Penn State <a href="http://live.psu.edu/story/47378">release</a> and <a href="http://blogs.nature.com/news/thegreatbeyond/2010/07/penn_state_clears_michael_mann_1.html">a story</a> in <em>Nature</em>. In what some have called "climategate," Mann was accused of falsifying research in support of his famous "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockey_stick_controversy">hockey stick</a>" graph that portrays a recent spike in global temperatures.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Note: <em>reporter not wearing reading glasses originally typed the wrong spelling for "stick"</em>, and headline has been changed from "Penn" to "Penn State"</p>
http://www.readthehook.com/67184/cuccinellis-target-mann-cleared-penn-state-faculty#comments_BreakingNewsCrime/JusticeUVAclimategateken cuccinelliFri, 02 Jul 2010 10:50:35 +0000hawes67184 at http://www.readthehook.comFace-off: Casteen to fight Cuccinelli climate inquesthttp://www.readthehook.com/67533/face-casteen-fight-cuccinelli-climate-inquest
<!&#8211; This will not be inserted &#8211;><!&#8211; This will not be inserted &#8211;><div class="captionLeftLandscape"><a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/news-cuccinelli-casteen-i.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-33484" title="news-cuccinelli-casteen-i" src="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/news-cuccinelli-casteen-i-325x190.jpg" alt="news-cuccinelli-casteen-i" width="325" height="190" /></a><strong>Casteen vows to fight Cuccinelli's inquest.</strong><br />
<small>FILE PHOTOS BY LISA PROVENCE, CUCCINELLI CAMPAIGN<br />
</small></div>
<p>Lamenting that the controversial climate <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/index.php/2010/04/29/oh-mann-cuccinelli-targets-uva-papers-in-climategate-salvo/">inquest launched last month</a> by Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has "sent a chill" through Virginia colleges and universities, UVA President John Casteen announced Thursday that the University of Virginia has filed papers in Albemarle Circuit Court to fight the inquest.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Remarking that Cuccinelli's Civil Investigative Demands, or CIDs are sending "a chill that has reached across the country and attracted the attention of all of higher education," Casteen, in a <a href="http://www.virginia.edu/uvatoday/newsRelease.php?id=12022">prepared statement</a>, portrays his stand on the issue as a defense of academic freedom.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">AG Cuccinelli, however, portrays it as a potential swindle.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"This is about rooting out possible fraud and not about infringing upon academic freedom," Cuccinelli said in <a href="http://www.oag.state.va.us/PRESS_RELEASES/Cuccinelli/51910_VA_Tech.html">his own statement</a>, issued eight days earlier.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">At issue is about half a million dollars in research grants obtained over several years by then UVA climate researcher Michael Mann, who is now at Penn State University. Mann's most famous contribution to popular climate science is the so-called "hockey stick graph," which portrays global temperatures as spiking, like the blade of a hockey stick. However, after the unauthorized release of emails from a British climate center, the motives of the some researchers, including Mann, have come under question.</p>
http://www.readthehook.com/67533/face-casteen-fight-cuccinelli-climate-inquest#comments_BreakingNewsFeaturedCrime/JusticeEducationclimategateJohn Casteenken cuccinelliThu, 27 May 2010 21:03:09 +0000hawes67533 at http://www.readthehook.comFighting back? UVA mulls options for Cuccinelli climate demandhttp://www.readthehook.com/67578/fighting-back-uva-mulls-options-cuccinelli-climate-demand
<div class="captionLeftLandscape"><a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/ken_cuccinelli_04.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-32072" title="ken_cuccinelli_04" src="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/ken_cuccinelli_04-325x215.jpg" alt="ken_cuccinelli_04" width="325" height="215" /></a><strong>Show him the papers&#8211;- or else.</strong><br />
<small>CUCCINELLI CAMPAIGN<br />
</small></div>
<p>Less than a month after Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/index.php/2010/04/29/oh-mann-cuccinelli-targets-uva-papers-in-climategate-salvo/">demanded that UVA turn over</a> any and all documents relating to the work of climate scientist and former UVA professor Michael Mann, 800 Virginia professors and scientists have signed a letter condemning the move, and the ACLU has urged UVA to resist.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"It's the obligation of the university, in the name of academic freedom, not to simply give in but to ask a court to demand that the AG provide a legally defensible reason for his demand," says Kent Willis, executive director the Virginia ACLU.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Cuccinelli, however, isn't backing down.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">On Wednesday, May 19, he released a statement addressing the Mann matter and defending his tactics.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"This is a fraud investigation, and the attorney general’s office is not investigating Dr. Mann’s scientific conclusions," the statement reads. "The legal standards for the misuse of taxpayer dollars," the statement continues, "apply the same at universities as they do at any other agency of state government. This is about rooting out possible fraud and not about infringing upon academic freedom."<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Cuccinelli's Civil Investigative Demand charges that Mann&#8211;- famous for his "hockey stick" model of climate change and who left UVA in 2005 for Penn State&#8211;- may have fraudulently received up to $500,000 in state grants by falsifying his data to gloomily portray global warming.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">The statement came just a day after Cuccinelli made similar comments at a barbecue in Ivy for the abstinence-only education program <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/stories/2006/07/13/NEWS-abstinence-d.doc.aspx">Worth Your Wait</a>.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">“They need not worry,” Cuccinelli said of his critics, according to the <em>Daily Progress</em>. “The same rule of law, the same objective fact-finding process will take place.“<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">His words, however, have not soothed the ACLU's Willis.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">"In some ways," says Willis, "it doesn't matter why the Attorney General is conducting the investigation. The question for us is, what should UVA do?"<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Although UVA initially announced plans to "meet our legal obligation," a stern letter from the ACLU and the American Association of University Professors urging the university to challenge the demand in court as well as a letter signed by 800 scientists and professors&#8211;- nearly 300 of them from UVA&#8211;- seem to have had some sway. UVA has now hired the international law firm Hogan Lovells to consider its options and has sought and received both an extension on the deadline and a reduction in the amount of documents it has been asked to provide.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace"><span class="article_font">“Research universities must defend the privilege of academic freedom in the creation of new knowledge," said UVA rector John O. "Dubby" Wynne in a May 14 statement.</span><br />
</p><p class="whitespace">Originally due May 27, UVA now has until July 26 to produce the documents or announce plans to challenge the demand in court.<br />
</p><p class="whitespace">By challenging the Attorney General's demand, Willis says that UVA would be doing two things: "Acting in defense of academic freedom and also using the law available to make sure the Attorney General isn't on an ideologically-driven fishing trip for information."</p>
http://www.readthehook.com/67578/fighting-back-uva-mulls-options-cuccinelli-climate-demand#comments_BreakingNewsFeaturedclimategateken cuccinelliFri, 21 May 2010 10:32:41 +0000courteney67578 at http://www.readthehook.comCuccinelli drapes state seal goddess's breasthttp://www.readthehook.com/67781/cuccinelli-drapes-state-seal-goddesss-breast
<p>The <em>Virginian-Pilot</em> has <a href="http://hamptonroads.com/2010/04/cuccinelli-opts-more-modest-state-seal">the scoop</a> on the <a href="http://www.readthehook.com/blog/index.php/2010/04/29/oh-mann-cuccinelli-targets-uva-papers-in-climategate-salvo/">active attorney general</a> and the bosom of Virtus.</p>
http://www.readthehook.com/67781/cuccinelli-drapes-state-seal-goddesss-breast#comments_BreakingNewsGovt/Politicsken cuccinellivirginia state sealSun, 02 May 2010 16:38:50 +0000hawes67781 at http://www.readthehook.comAG Cuccinelli to sue over Obamacarehttp://www.readthehook.com/68277/ag-cuccinelli-sue-over-obamacare
<p>Is the ink on President <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obamacare">Obama's new health-care bill</a> dry? That's the question that will determine when Virginia Attorney General <a href="http://www.roanoke.com/news/breaking/wb/240770">Ken Cuccinelli files suit</a> to stop it as unconstitutional. The law comes with high hopes for creating a more equitable health system that doesn't bankrupt families if a health crisis strikes. But because the bill's backers&#8211;- who include 5th District Representative <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Perriello">Tom Perriello</a>&#8211;- typically invoke the commerce clause to satisfy Constitutional concerns over the bill's requirement that every American buy health insurance, Cuccinelli may have an opening. “Just being alive," Cuccinelli writes in <a href="http://www.oag.state.va.us/PRESS_RELEASES/Cuccinelli/32210_Health_Care_Bill.html">a release</a>, "is not interstate commerce."</p>
http://www.readthehook.com/68277/ag-cuccinelli-sue-over-obamacare#comments_BreakingNewsGovt/Politicsken cuccinelliobamacareMon, 22 Mar 2010 16:00:39 +0000hawes68277 at http://www.readthehook.com